The perfect introduction to the Master Over a century after his death Richard Wagner’s music dramas stand at the centre of the culture of classical music He was a walking contradiction aggressive flirtatious disciplined capricious heroic visionary & poisonously anti-Semitic His ten great mature masterpieces constitute an unmatched body of work created against a backdrop of poverty revolution violent controversy critical contempt & hysterical hero-worship In this book Simon Callow plunges the reader headlong into Wagner’s world examining the intellectual & artistic climate of this composer like no other who ever lived creator of perhaps the most sublime & most troubling body of work in the history of music